


Ghost of the temple

by noxumbre



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Animal Death, Redemption
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-11
Updated: 2017-10-25
Packaged: 2018-09-23 12:38:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9657803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noxumbre/pseuds/noxumbre
Summary: Reaper is sent to destroy the Shambali by Talon before he's defeated and kept in a cell. The new leader after Mondatta's death takes pity on him and sets on of the monks to help rehabilitated him.





	1. Darkness Falls

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by high-noon-saloon’s post http://high-noon-saloon.tumblr.com/post/156740462879/does-anyone-else-think-about-what-would-happen-if
> 
> Random-stitches and high-noon-saloon from over on Tumblr both helped me get this reading nice (I only just got my account on here I don't know if either of them have one).

Icy chills blow through the mountains, and all the monks have entered sleep mode in the inner sanctum of the temple. Well, almost all. Zenyatta was outside giving council to his student:  
“Master I don’t know if I belong here, I’m not an omnic like the others...”  
“There is more to the Shambali than the mere wires and chrome that form our bodies. This was the principle we were founded on. All that exists is formed from the same materials, you simply possess more carbon compared to my brothers and sisters made from steel. Yet despite this, we are-”  
“All one within the Iris, yes master.” 

The wind howls as black fog encroaches on the monastery. It takes a humanoid form and sees the two talking from a distance. “So this is where Genji has been hiding from me”, he begins to shadowstep. Disguised as another breath of cold air, he flows down to them, blanketed in falling snow. He lines up a shot on Genji from the darkness beside a bronze statue, but the cyborg’s senses alert him to the danger. He sends a fan of shurikens at the figure before rushing towards him. Reaper meets the challenge and fired at shot at the cyborg’s head, but Genji draws his blade to deflect the brimstone buckshot. The wraith turns to smoke, dodging the returning fire, Genji thrusts his blade towards Reaper’s chest, but slips through, trapping the sword between bricks of the monastery.

“Too easy.” Reaper drawls as he reforms from his nanite mist, aiming a gun to the back of the cyborg’s head as he struggles to free his weapon. His finger on the trigger, Reaper is struck by a speeding orb.  
“This is a place of peace.” Zenyatta cautions “Do not sully it with blood.”  
“I wasn’t planning on it. Tin cans don’t bleed, after all.”  
The monk is unaffected by the threat, although his student is clearly distraught. Genji lets go of the short sword to draw his katana, intending to cleave the phantom, but Zenyatta raises his hand, gesturing to stop and also greet the uninvited guest.  
“I sense disquiet in your soul.”

“I’ll be all better once I take his.” Zenyatta shows no outward emotion, but once again glances to Genji to tell him to stay out of the situation. Zenyatta places his hands together as the orbs spin around him. “Ha, desperate monk’s final prayer?” Reaper turns away to finish Genji, but upon seeing the sword abandoned and a lack of green lights, he turns back to Zenyatta, too late to avoid the Omnic’s trap. A series of orbs fly fast and knock the mercenary out cold.

 

A few hours later, he awakes in a sealed room covered in flowing light. A digital voice greets him “Good morning, Reaper”. Looking around, Reaper sees that one of the walls has formed a holo-screen showing an omnic monk bearing 5 dots on its forehead and a copper jaw. “Do not worry, we did not remove your mask. My brothers and I decided you should keep it in case it bore importance”. Reaper paced the room, staring daggers at the omnic on the screen.  
“No prison can hold me”, the man said.  
“This is no prison. When Master Zenyatta awoke us, we communed on what to do with you.”  
”If this isn’t a prison where am I?”  
”You are still at the monastery, in one of the guest rooms. Brother Genji suggested it would be safer for you to be sealed off. We have heard of the things you’ve done.” Reaper turns to smoke and presses the cloud against each wall, looking for cracks to seep through. When he finally reforms after finding nothing, he appears before the holo-screen “If you know what I’ve done, you know you’d better let me out. Especially if you're kind can feel pain.”  
The omnic tries not to flinch “Why did you choose to embody the image of death?”  
”If you're trying psychoanalyse me, you’re shit out of luck, five-eyes.”  
The omnic places their hand on the wall and the screen in reaper’s room grows to reach all corners of the wall. The omnic drops into lotus position “Why do you fight, Reaper?”  
“Vengeance.”  
“For what?”  
Reaper grunts and turns away from the screen, avoiding the question.  
“Reaper?”  
The omnic gets no response from the black-clad mercenary.

 

Days have passed. Reaper has remained in the room, refusing to engage in conversation. When he does decide to speak, it’s either death threats or asking Genji to give him a real fight. Several times a day, the copper-jawed omnic visits the wall panel to speak with him.  
“You ever going to leave me alone?”  
“I seek only to talk.”  
“Fine, I’ll play along. It all started when I was a little kid I had a pet bird, I loved them so much and they got shot by a hunter when I took them to the forest, and…” He bursts into laughter, unable to maintain his sarcasm. “I can’t even finish this”, Reaper says, continuing to chuckle as he dissipates into a cloud.  
“I will return later, Reaper.” The omnic places their hand on the wall, closing the holo-screen.

“I haven’t been able to get through to him. I do not believe I am up to the task, Tekhartha.”  
“Do not doubt yourself. There is reason you were given him as your pupil.” 

“Reaper.” He doesn’t audibly respond to the call, but summons a shotgun and turns his head towards the holo-screen.  
“Reaper, I have looked through the information I can find on you. I noticed that your physiology is different from that of a normal human.”  
The omnic steps over to the doorway and opens it a crack, letting a few rodents into the room  
“These were found in the garden. If they stayed, they would have killed all the plants. At least like this their deaths will be giving life”  
Reaper turns to smoke, and within seconds of touching the rodents they have disappeared. Upon reforming, Reaper takes a few deep breaths. “Thanks”  
“I am sworn to help my pupil”  
“Just what in the hell makes you so interested in me?”  
“You fight to feed correct? I understand that it puts you in a troublesome position. Harmony requires a balance of life and death, a being like you is a symbol of that.”  
“You have any other sayings from a fortune cookie?”  
The omnic lowers their head.  
“I am sorry. I have only recently risen to the rank in which I may take on pupils. I’m not sure how to do this like the more experienced masters… I suppose you are done talking for the day. I’ll see you later Reaper.”  
“Finally”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I understand the thing about the Monk letting Reaper eat those rodents is kinda sickening to some readers (I'm not completely comfortable with it either). But Reaper needs to consume creatures to live and having them just vanish because he consumed them whole seemed like the best way to handle it. I don't intend to show him "feeding" every time because I know it could get to some readers but yeah I felt like I had to feature it here to show how he's staying alive.


	2. Warrior’s salute

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Reaper has been at the monastery for some time now, it's not the first time he's been held captive so he's remaining cold and distant. but this front breaks and he gets a visit from the last none-omnic pupil to be taken on by the Shambali

A few weeks pass Theratta has been allowing Reaper to ‘feed’ by volunteering to take care of the rodents that pester the monastery and sneaking them into his room the time comes where she must once again report progress to Tekhartha  
“Master zenyatta; progress with Reaper is slow he is a guarded soul, but he has at least stopped clawing and firing at the walls of his room, as well as no longer issuing threats to my safety or to that of your pupil Genji this is due to him actually changing his attitude or trying trick us to let him out I can’t say”  
“Wonderful tell me about it”

“Good morning reaper”  
“Hey”  
The monk is taken aback by this for the first time Reaper has responding without even making a gesture indicating malicious intent The monk chokes back a few words and celebration to avoid embarrassing her pupil, Reaper notices and shoots daggers at the center dot on the omnic’s head.  
He flicks the spiked thumb out showing it gleam in the light “Watch your tongue”  
“I don’t have one but I recognize what you’re trying say”  
Reaper sits back against the room’s wall   
“I assume that you’ve had enough for today I’ll be back tomorrow”  
“Smart move”  
“Greetings Tekhartha I assume Genji already told you”  
“Indeed but for sake of tradition I’d like you to tell me”

The Shambali being someone mechanical in their commitment to routine always start the day the same each morning at sunrise they all make their way to the courtyard and practice tai chi, Theratta uses this opportunity to meet up with Genji. After the monks have finished she goes over to the cyborg and requests a favour  
“Brother Genji can you assist me with something”  
“Is it about Reaper”  
Theratta freezes up worried there may still be bad blood since the night of the fight weakly she responds “Ye...yeah ?”  
Genji removes his faceplate looks so sharply at the omnic’s he sees a clear reflection of his own face  
“Are you sure he is ready to see me without trying to fight”  
“Yes”  
“Then I’ll meet you and him whenever you request”

 

Later that day Theratta walks to Reaper’s room struggling to keep pace with Genji, she tugs on his shoulder “let him see me first”  
“As you wish”  
“Reaper, I have brought a guest today”  
Reaper raises his arm to his side and stares down the holo-screen. Genji walks infront of the camera Reaper without hesitation summons a shotgun and points it to the door  
“So you finally answered the call?”  
Theratta rushes between the camera and Genji “No, Reaper please can you just talk to him...please”   
Reaper relents and lowers his gun before it fades back into mist and rejoins his form   
“So what do you want me to talk about”  
Genji looks to the omnic and looks back at Reaper “Why did you come here?”  
“Because I was hired to”  
“To kill me?”  
“No that was a added bonus, the mission was to eliminate the entire Shambali”  
Genji stares at Theratta she whispers “yey, progress. He’s opening up to me” broken up by nervous laughter   
“Are you ashamed to of been caught”  
“I spent three weeks demanding a rematch...what do you think?”  
Genji scans reaper’s stance   
“For what it’s worth you fought well if it wasn’t for my master’s seeing the discord within you, you would of won”  
Reaper raises his fist to his face and laughs as he cracks his fingers  
“You were good, a bit hotheaded for a monk”  
“Hmm I will seek to fix that”  
Genji bows before the camera and takes his leave  
The omnic a bit flabbergasted asks “That was it..?”  
“That was enough to see he is not the beast the news is familiar with”  
She takes a few steps and returns to the panel  
“Sooooo how was that?”  
“Is it really that easy to see my demons?”  
“Zenyatta is one of the best here, it takes seconds for him to notice when someone carries darkness”  
Under his breath, he mumbles “if only Sombra could work that quick”


	3. Dead man walking

The moon hangs over the monastery tens of rodents litter the yard chewing on all the vegetation in sight.   
“huh you little guys sure come in large numbers”  
Theratta walks through the halls towards Reaper’s cell. “hey! Stop chew-wwwwwwwwwwwwwww kkktk-res!” Her wrist spasms launching the rodents around the room and scatter into each and every nook and cranny before she can recover from the system shock.

Tink. the monk lays face planted on the ground and the lights fade out and then flash red, green and blue, yellow, magenta, cyan, white before settling back on yellow.

 

Diagnostics: … … … Software at 100%, identifying hardware damage  
Torso clear, head clear, legs clear, arms… arms operating at 76.5% focusing diagnostic

Diagnostics: … … … right arm at 100% left arm operating at 47% identifying error  
Diagnostics: … Left hand power cable Severed, Unable to resolve automatically seek external repair

 

The LEDs flash once more this time From yellow slowly turning white and finally back to their regular cyan at that point the monk stands up, an attempt to wipe their face is made but it results in one hand doing as instructed and the other making a harsh clunk “THE RODENTS!” now being brought into a frantic hurry they start searching the area and then resolve to playback their blackbox….  
”damn it”.

Slow and solemn steps head deep into the Monastery towards Reaper’s catacomb. After a few tries with the damaged hand Theratta manages to activate the Holo-screen;

“Greetings Reaper”  
“Hey Theratta”  
“The rodents got away from me they were chewing at my wires and I tried get them back and…they’re gone”  
Reaper shoulders tense but once he notices he tries to relax his stance “I take it you don’t have experience as a hunter”  
“No, I was activated bit over a decade ago in Russia, They didn’t really trust us Omnics to do well anything involving weapons, it was a struggle for a celebrity chef to record their show there because they weren’t allowed to hold knives in the presence of humans… I’m sure you can guess why I ended up abandoning the place”  
Reaper crouches down in front of the door “I had to abandon things important to me a few years ago too”  
“Because you became this?”  
“Tch…. I became this because of what made me need to ditch the joint” Reaper scrapes his clawed finger against the scars on his mask and gives a deathly cackle, Theratta swallows her fear and mewls “does it hurt?... when you turn to smoke”  
Reaper forms a cloud and reforms inches from the screen “imagine if thought sentenced your form to be ripped apart, set to the flame and then the ashes tossed together resulting in a foul mockery of what once was only to be done again” he turns back to a smog reforms sitting in the center of the room. Theratta nods listening to Reaper…   
Reaper’s form is lithe his arms are thinning his gauntlets barely seem to fit, the passive smolder that tends to come off him is thicker than normal.  
Theratta crosses her arm over her chest and squeezes her shoulder with an iron grip “I’m gonna go out on a limb on this so um please don’t kill me” she bashes her hand on the wall panel and leaves it there long enough so that the door slowly creaks open. The holo-screen in reaper’s room flickers out then reforms smaller near the as natural light touches his necrotic body for the first time in some weeks. Reaper blankly stares at her “I take it it’s time for my hour in the yard?”  
Theratta’s legs quake as the ghoul steps out its gilded tomb “I can’t catch these things on my own and you’ll die if you don’t eat...just please don’t use your guns” Reaper cracks his joints and takes a few steps away from his cell “Fine”.  
Theratta claps her hands and analyses the echoes to locate the rats running rampant and reaper’s wraith form washes over them. The Reaper rebuilds their body and flexes showing off their restored physique. Cracking his neck and knuckles he lets out a baritone chuckle. 

“I should get back the other’s will get scared to hell and back if they see me out of my cage” as reaper’s footsteps ring through the halls Theratta freezes trying to process what’s happening “You, you don’t have to.” He stops still as the statues and turns his head almost slow enough to be audible “You are my student and I believe you shouldn’t be locked up all the time!” like an old door Reaper lurches over to the omnic “kid, this is one of the stupidest things you’ve done” 

Theratta’s LEDs flicker before she shakes her head in defiance “Even if that’s right, and it isn’t I am the master you are the pupil and you must listen!”

 

“Tch if you say so.”

 

“I do!” Theratta still shaking adds “now… You have missed the morning tai chi every single day since you got here”

She proceeds to lead Reaper to the yard “I take it you prefer the dead of night to sunrise so I’ll run you through the basics now and Tekhartha willing you’ll be able join us in the morning”   
Theratta starts a stretch and Reaper stares “why the hell are you stretching you’re a machine.”  
“Well…” she stops a moment trying to figure out the answer herself “You aren’t so I figured it’ll be nice to get you warmed up”  
“I have my own routine” Reaper cracks his neck and hands and proceeds to jet the spikes on his gauntlet to an imaginary opponent. Theratta stares analysing the brutality  
“So you do this everyday?”  
“Normally better but I’m a bit rusty”  
“It’s quite… Vicious”  
“So long as they aren’t standing when it hits them it could look like ballet for all I care”  
Theratta peaks up “Well. how about I show some moves that are effective and elegant!”  
“I’m tempted to remove my mask just so you can see me rolling my eyes”  
“Why didn’t you?”

Theratta continues leading the routine and looks stark forward “You’d fit in with some of the masters here, they often take vows of silence”.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fucking hell this is way overdue. like wow I have not updated this for ages. I've been flummoxed trying to figure out how to get this trainwreck on the road. it was hard making it feel like this all wasn't suddenly moving and so I was thinking of how to do it all this time and now so after ages I went fuck it and just moved forward with the scenes without questioning if it feels like it's happening too fast


	4. ¡Apagando las luces!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What to do when the world's best hacker wants her favourite bodyguard back?

“Thank you for seeing me again Tekhartha”

“Anytime my sister, it has been a few months since you took on your pupil, how is your progress”

“I believe he's come along well he still seems reluctant to join in communal activities”

A more organic voice calls out“Is it maintaining persona or guilt?” between scrapes of a blade against whetstone

“No! I mean the first I… I’m not sure” Theratta aims her copper jaw to the floor   
The Tekhartha places a hand on her shoulder “focus yourself. Look inwards, what is it you believe?”   
“...I. I believe he has locked away his true self. I believe he’s carrying a lot of secrets, to me and to himself.” her words spike higher pitch and quicker as the sentence goes on. She scans the entire room hoping for feedback from the wise monk or even the cyborg. However, they both remain silent.

 

Finally, the silence is broken by Genji returning to honing his blade resuming the consistent scratching, Theratta stands up “I’ll be at my leave, thank you for your time wise one”    
the door shuts behind her   
“Did you have to be so cold Master?”   
“Would you rather be guided through a darkened forest by someone who kept their eyes on the path only looking back to ensure your safety or someone who kept their eyes over their shoulder for someone to tell them they are heading in the right direction?”   
“Then why agree to see her?”   
“Even a trained guide requires a hermit who knows the woods to assist them sometimes. I must watch for those times”   
  
  


The reaper glares at the Omnics from the shade of a tree when he spies the cross of Theratta’s LEDs he dispels and reemergence beside her. “How did the meet up with Zen go?”

She pipes out in surprise “F-fine, say can you walk like a regular person?”

“Can the tekhartha?”

...The befuddled bot walks on side by side with the phantom “you don't have to stay on your own all the time”

“Yes, because everyone wants to spend time with the man who was contracted kill them and everyone they love”

“We must know to forgive and move past what has been done or what we were put here to do”

Reaper holds still a moment before taking point ahead of his master and after a short eternity mutters “you really think that's possible at this point?”

Theratta lifts her head high “if you are willing”

 

Later that night Reaper ruminates on the month he's spent ‘guest ’ he stares into the reflective metal door of his room scratching at his mask.

His taloned mits clutch the edge of the mask reading to lift it 

 

_ how long has it been since I looked under this thing? _

 

A stinge runs through him as his flesh responds to light slowing the reveal; then. Darkness. 

 

_ The hell? _

 

Moments pass in the void before a purple grin appears on the holo-screen 

“Gabe! It's been a while did you miss me? I missed you, Itsy bitsy is Not the conversationalist and Akande is all business ugh”   
  
“What the hell did you do Sombra”   
“Your job”   
  
“Bwahaha you should see the look on your face… well I should, you need to take that mask off sooner or later. Anyway the Shambali are still alive just...sleeping, a easy hack makes a surge go through the left arm causing the protector to think it’s going overload so they shutdown and in the split second after the shutdown and before their firewalls are back up a little tiny code is entered that makes them stay dormant. Really it’s nothing for a professional li-”   
“Sombra! What are you doing here”    
“Busting you out apparently, I just swung by to see how you were getting on with your mission, never thought ‘The Reaper’ would be taken down by just a bunch of monks”   
“It’s not just a bunch of monks; Genji is here”   
“Shimada?”   
“Know any others?”   
“Aww, Gabe did you have second thoughts about taking out one of your precious ex-Blackwatch recruits?”   
“Shut it.”   
“Or maybe,” Sombra raises her arms and leg into the crane position “The student has become the master wha-ha!”   
“Are you going open this door?”   
“Not sure yet.” Sombra puts her hand to her face and taps her finger against her cheek.   
“Sombra”   
“Hang on”   
“Sombra”   
“Hey don’t rush me”   
“Sombra!”   
“What”   
  
“Ahem,” a copper omnic rudely interrupts.    
Sombra goes to hit them with the butt of her SMG but they dodge and go for a palm strike against her chest, She cloaks. The omnic now stands still she grabs a pole from the side of the room and starts to spin it in all directions attempting to locate the gremlin “Fight face to face!”   
Sombra well in her thermo-camo hacks the door and then stands by it waiting for Reaper to do his thing…   
  
He takes a few steps out of the cell and turns to her “get out of here”   
“Anytime, but first we got a loose end to tie up”   
Theratta brandishes her weapon aiming it to the Talon agents   
“I’ll handle this you get out of here”   
“You got your ass kicked by one of the monks and mr roboto and you’ve been in a cell for a few months you’re bound to be weak I’m not leaving you to a fair fight”   
Theratta through courage, anger or hurt cries out “How long have you been planning this?!”   
Sombra taps on a holo-screen “me, like a couple days, the omnic hack I wrote for another gig a week back, surprised how it didn’t work on you. Re-re can we take their body back so I can examine it”   
Reaper remains silent ignoring both questions before saying “Sombra. Get. Out.” in his usual stark grim tone.   
  
Sombra scrunches her face in confusion “what the hell dude? That is no way to talk to the person who’s busting you out”   
“I’m not done here. Theratta. Get back to the main hall and try wake the others”   
Sombra twitches and throws her arm out thin pink strings sink into Theratta like marionette wires   
“No. things only go the way I want them too.”    
Glitched excuses for dialogue escapes Theratta’s sound module as her lights flash all colours and then resting on purple.

“Gabe come on”   
“Sombra.”   
“Gabe I hold all the cards, I have the information, the power, a hostage. And I want you back,  **we** had a plan for Talon and what do you alway say? Stick to the plan Sombra?”   
  
_ Especially not after that Russian found my hideout _ __  
__  
“Plan changed.”   
“Not mine”   
“Sombra that bot isn't worth the effort”

“When is anything I do? Now come on back to the ship cabrón”

 

Reaper walks along with Sombra and their hypnotised hostage “what the hell did you do to her?”

“Hmm? Oh, the omnic, I just took control of her body, the AI is in there somewhere but can't do anything you want talk to her?”

“...No”

Sombra fires a neon line to Theratta and when it dissipates she shrieks “Reaper! What is this, where are you taking me!”

“I don't have anything to do with this, it's all  **her** ”

“Stop this! As your master I-”

Sombra’s laughter stops her in her tracks.

“Master, wait were you playing the long con, living like one of them all this time?”

An exasperated Gabe pleads “Shut up Sombra”

Theratta struggles to take control of her body to no avail as Sombra leads the way back to her ship

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> idk if I wrote Sombra being too mean in this chapter? like she's normally jokey and having fun but in this instance, her plan is falling apart and she's dealing with variables that she couldn't expect so she's a bit agitated and off her game. not sure if she's gone too far, let me know what you think


	5. Assembling a Skeleton Crew

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> well, now it looks Reaper has developed a bit of a motley crew, I suppose this would be the last one in the first act

Like most of her things Sombra’s Private (and by private we means deleted from Talon’s inventory/systems so it doesn't officially exist unless she wants it to be used) transport ship is customised, panels ripped off wires removed replaced and renovated, self reliant with autopilot, low grade robot staff instead of human or Omnic. As well as neon purple paint and Calaveras all over. At least she didn't rip out or deface the Italian leather seats. In those seats sit Theratta and Sombra.

 

Reyes stands stark across from them  
  
“I know you aren’t doing this for Talon, what do you want Sombra”  
“My partner in time back.”  
  
Sombra leans forward “I take it you don’t want to be the bad guy anymore? You’ve done it all haven’t you Reaps? The dashing saviour of humanity, the ruggish anti-hero, the monstrous villain; and in secret the anti-villain trying to make the world better from inside the darkness.”  
“You forgetting who’s here”  
“Oh her, I can just wipe her memory”  
“Reaper!”

Reaper sighs “we’re not wiping or killing her”

_When did I get so soft?_

He kneels to the Omnic “I'll explain this mess at some point but for now don’t do anything” then he rises into a posture commanding authority “O, Sombra you can't take me in, you take me in I can burn us both down”

The fake-out shook the hacker to her core she tries to regain composure “Re. Reyes. I won't go down without a fight, I just want us side by side”

“And I will be by your side to take down Talon from its core. But not how I used to,” Reyes goes to lower his mask and tosses it to the ground “you can tell them Reaper is dead”  


* * *

 

The transport landed some miles out in the mountains far from anything, Theratta was freed from Sombra’s control and the three of them sit as the (ex)Talon agents discuss their next moves.

“I’ll return with your mask, telling them you died en route?”

“They'll try to send a team recover a body to see if they can recreate what I am”

“It's a huge mountain range, we’d have time to figure out who they sent and where to take them out” Reyes draws his claw across his  neck for emphasis

Theratta chimes in “do we have to kill?”

Sombra says “trust me, sweetheart, these guys don't deserve any mercy”

Theratta tries to argue “The Iris teaches that all life is-”

Sombra hacks Theratta’s speech module “wow Gabe how did you put up with this for months”

“Sombra don't do that.”

“Pfft fine” she wags her fingers undoing her work

Reyes wraiths out the ship “I’ll check the perimeter”

 

Sombra rolls her head back  
  
_Just like Gabe to go hardass merc instead of talking_

  
Her eyes serf the room and settle on the monk “so, sorry for the rude introduction, I’m usually more fun to hang out with”

“I'm… sure”

“So once the chaos died down I noticed you had a cut wire you want me take care of that?”

Theratta stays silent

“Alright, I guess you have reason not trust me. But I'm good you saw how well this bird flies”

 

_Zenyatta does teach us to view the best in everyone_

 

Theratta holds out the olive branch or in this case mechanised arm and with an impish grin Sombra grabs some tools from beside the couch and gets to work.

“I learned a thing or two about prosthetics as a teen, and a few more from Doomfist when I joined Talon.”  
Sombra babbles on as she works the monk nods along; and then her hand jerks back to life “and there we go. How’s it running”  
Theratta toys with the newly reconnected limb testing and calibrating and looks over with a warm tone “just how it was when I was first assembled”  


* * *

 

The Reaper stares into the snow prints confirming his suspicions  


_We were followed I knew it_  


A loose shuriken heads for the phantom’s skull but skews off course, fight or flight takes hold and in a gust of smoke he lunges towards its source but still to the side concealing in a shadow  
  
Before him stands a shaking cyborg anger overflowing through his seams,  
“How dare you! Master believed in you! We all put our faith you could better yourself!”  
“This wasn’t my plan”  
“You had no problem going along with it”  
“Like I had a choice”  
“You could of fought!” the shinobi’s bark echoes loud and causes snow to fall from tree branches  
“I thought you monks didn’t like killing”  
“In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not exactly like the rest of the Shambali”  
“Whatever kid,” Reyes tries to walk off and is stopped by a shrunken.  
“You are not getting away with this”  
  
Reyes stares him down “I guess we’re having that rematch.”  
Genji draws his sword “This time Zenyatta won’t be here to show you mercy”

 

The shinobi dashes forward with a cleaving strike as the spectre barrels to the side and claws at the blade.

 

_You never changed Shimada_

 

Genji twists oh his heels to unleash a whirlwind, the Reaper turns to a puff of smoke letting the blade whif through causing no harm once he loses momentum Reyes turns back to flesh and delivers a strike to the base of the cyborg’s skull; the force launches him far across the snow as his sword falls halfway between the two men.

 

Genji’s vision glitches lines wave across and he attempts to stand but then kneels facing outward to the forest. He repeats a verse he composed in his Blackwatch days;

_“Born a prince of crime,_

_Here I stand at devil’s blade,_

_At my second death”_

 

Reyes stands across uttering “you're hardly standing”

 

“Do it!” Genji yells

The wraith begins to walk forward, Genji remains in his pose accepting his fate more

“Genji, I'm not interested in being the bad guy anymore. So if you want to die here, you can rip your heart out and hunch over in the snow,” reaper holds out his hand “Or stand by me and make any asshole that comes to finish the job I quit pay”

 

Genji pulls himself up with Reaper’s arm and looks at the face of death

“You look terrible without the mask”

“Look who's talking”

Genji’s grip gets tighter at the remark but he releases shortly

“You better have a plan how to awaken the Shambali”

“It's taken care of they'll awake at dawn like normal unaware of what happened tonight. That is, unless you tell?”

 

“And the girl? The one who led you away? Is she handled?”

“She's trustworthy”

“After what she did?”

“Just a jailbreak, she didn't actively try to kill anyone”

**Author's Note:**

> I understand the thing about the Monk letting Reaper eat those rodents is kinda sickening to some readers (I'm not completely comfortable with it either). But Reaper needs to consume creatures to live and having them just vanish because he consumed them whole seemed like the best way to handle it. I don't intend to show him "feeding" every time because I know it could get to some readers but yeah I felt like I had to feature it here to show how he's staying alive.


End file.
